How & why did Hartsfield–Jackson Atlanta International Airport become THE WORLD'S BUSIEST AIRPORT? (Dallas: 2013, income)

[Born 2 Roll]

Originally Posted by cwkimbro

Good Point, but it is worth noting that is only true for NYC. If you add ORD and Midway together, they still move less passengers than ATL. ORD is still a very busy airport though.

This is an excellent point.

Though, it should be noted that up until about 1998 when Hartsfield took the title, Chicago O'Hare Airport was the busiest airport on the planet even with the presence of a somewhat strong second airport in Chicago in Midway.

Even after losing the title of the world's busiest airport in 1998, O'Hare remained tied with or a very-close second to Hartsfield until about 2003 when the Feds began increasingly restricting the amount of air traffic in and out of O'Hare because of how delays at O'Hare have the ability to create delays throughout the entire U.S. air traffic network.

(...Midway itself was Chicago's main airport and the world's busiest airport before O'Hare took the title in the early 1960's.)

[lem1985]

birmingham and the whole state of alabama(Mobile especially) blew it a few times really but birmingham is trying to right itself to try and become what ot couldve been a long time ago

[tikigod311]

I had heard that one of the reasons Birmingham didn't take off (intended) as a major airport was due to the local geography. There is a large ridge to the south of the town, where as Atlanta has no real natural obstacle.

[Atlwarrior]

Also Delta was the first airline to pioneer the hub and spoke system, which feeds hundreds of flights into one city single for connecting passengers. Delta operates the single largest hub in the world out of Atlanta.

[Kraw]

Originally Posted by Newsboy

Two words: Delta Airlines

Actually, it's three words. Delta separates airlines. They are Delta Air Lines

We also owe a large part of the title to Delta Connection flights. The move to regional jets really boosted the number of operations (using 50 seat jets or smaller props in lieu of DC9's etc)

[Sammy215267]

Very interesting topic. I made a topic in the general u.s. form. And my topic was about the Northeast Airports and all the air traffic volume. It is the most congested in the country no surprise. But i was actually shocked to learn that NY's (JFK, EWR, LAG) AND Philadelphia Int'l (PHL) was the cause of the delays for most of the air traffic. I can easily see why ATL would be the busiest even passing JFK strangely lol. But it is a very interesting topics. JFK,EWR,PHL are all going through "NOT ENOUGH SPACE" PHL just approved $6.2 Billion in expansion (US AIRWAYS...RESIGNED A NEW LEASE) JFK has a plan in place to expand.

[HayateWind]

Originally Posted by Sammy215267

Very interesting topic. I made a topic in the general u.s. form. And my topic was about the Northeast Airports and all the air traffic volume. It is the most congested in the country no surprise. But i was actually shocked to learn that NY's (JFK, EWR, LAG) AND Philadelphia Int'l (PHL) was the cause of the delays for most of the air traffic. I can easily see why ATL would be the busiest even passing JFK strangely lol. But it is a very interesting topics. JFK,EWR,PHL are all going through "NOT ENOUGH SPACE" PHL just approved $6.2 Billion in expansion (US AIRWAYS...RESIGNED A NEW LEASE) JFK has a plan in place to expand.

If youn want to get technical, Atlanta has the busiest Air Route Traffic Control Center in the Nation, since it handles Atlanta, Nashville, Charlotte, Birmingham, and basically any flight that overflies or flies through the area, whether it's landing here or not. A bit of useless air traffic control trivia.

What really screws NYC up is having to organize all of that traffic onto the correct runways using routes that provide adequate and spacing and stuff to other aircraft. nextgen should help with that, hopefully lol.

[kasuga888]

Originally Posted by tarnishaluvsdontae

It's good for us to have this, y'all. Please don't open another airport and make the traffic go down. Look at New York and DC they have three airports for each and no one ever talks about those airports.

Some members may have bouts of depression if a 2nd airport were to be opened.

[tarnishaluvsdontae]

Originally Posted by kasuga888

Some members may have bouts of depression if a 2nd airport were to be opened.

I will have depression. I like to brag about our airport. Plus it is so fun to ride the little choo choo train back and forth with my kids. It's cheaper than Space Mountain!!! HA!

[Fastphilly]

Kind of funny that the worlds busiest airport has a small line up of foreign carriers compared to other major US airports.